Creek Party! is for sale

We started working on this house around 10 months ago. My husband can find the most beautiful pieces of property and then turn them into these amazing places to live. He really specializes in large tracts of land. I guess I should give you the deets...didn't really intend this to be a sponsored post. I will have to ask for compensation! haha

He owns his own real estate firm, High Pointe Properties. You can check out the website for listings  All of this to say, the Creek Party! house is for sale!! We are thrilled to put it on the market. We worked very hard to make this a place like none other in the state of Alabama. The cabin is a 3 bedroom, 2 bath, full size loft with many amenities...one being, it's in the middle of nowhere!

An amazing photographer, Alan Matthews, came out one rainy Sunday and snapped some great pics. We have been trying to get together for months! We finally decided to weather the rain and make it happen. Didn't get any of the outside of the house, but you can see that here or here.

I love this view from the windows that cover the front of the house. The wood-clad beams and just enough wood accents really gives this house a modern, yet rustic feel. The rocks you see on the fireplace surround were pulled from the creek. You will see those on the patio in the back, too! The floors are reclaimed hickory. Possibly my favorite flooring right now. We just added a clear, flat finish to these so you could see the natural beauty of them!

When you turn around and look out the windows instead of into the house, you see this. Seriously, this is right outside! The color was probably enhanced just a tad since it was a cloudy day, but this captures the view perfectly.

Downstairs is very rustic. The ceilings in this bedroom are red barn wood and the walls are old bleachers! They are so fun and still have plaques and holes for the bolts. We put a set of bunk beds in this room and would probably put another set if we had them.

This bedroom has the view of the creek. It has the same red barn wood on the ceiling with a little around the walls to accent the natural barn wood walls. The doors were all saved from the same house in Hanceville, Alabama. The floors on the bottom floor are stained concrete. You can see a couple of shots of the downstairs living space here.

I was so thankful when I grabbed Connor for a shot of the two of us. I love this picture. We enjoy building houses together. We have similar tastes and when we disagree, we can usually compromise! 

I have always loved this screen door. It serves no purpose. I just love to look at the size and character of it! It will go with me to another house.....more on that later! ;)

Doors, Doors, Doors

Our house on Shades Creek, we call it the Creek Party!, was built using (mostly) reclaimed materials. I bet you can guess where I got most of those reclaimed pieces! I knew I wanted to use old doors in this house. We have a bay door on the back looking out over the patio, and a couple of outside doors that are new, but for the most part, they are all reclaimed. Garlan was taking down a house in his neck of the woods at exactly the time I needed doors! Good for me? Good for him! He had exactly 8 interior doors still in their jambs that I could get. The front door was also available. It was perfect and how cool for them to all stay together. They were like orphan doors that needed to stay together. I was going to be their new mom!

I forgot to mention, hardware was also included! This was meant to be, don't you think? I love this little plastic cover on this doorknob. It has character....so, it's staying!

 This is in the downstairs bedroom. You can see 3 of the doors in this photo. We used barn wood to cover the walls. The red is on the ceiling and when we ran out of the brown skins, we pulled the red down like a trim for the top of the walls. I was a little worried that it might make the ceiling feel like it was coming down on you, but it just adds dimension. I love the way it turned out! Sometimes, I just pull together what I like and hope it all works together. I can't believe how well these doors look. This room looks like an old farmhouse that was built in the 1800's. I LOVE it!

Ok, so the front door from the house kinda got taken from me. Not really, (wink) it was too sentimental for me to keep. The sweetest lady came by while Garlan was taking down the house telling him it was her grandmother's house. She was talking to him about all of her memories there and how much she always loved that front door. Seriously? I had to let her have it, right? She and I have become "friends" on Facebook and I am so glad she has that door. It fills her with memories of her childhood. I love my "new" door. I had to scramble to get one. Honestly, I'm not picky. Garlan walked through the store and sent me a couple of pictures of doors that would work and this cute red door made the cut! It adds a fun element to the front of the house! My nephew asked his mom why I picked a door that was so old looking! She just said, "That's your Aunt Lucy, she likes things like that!". The door opened the wrong way and instead of filling the hole and it not looking like the rest of the door, Garlan added a piece of hardware from an old pocket door. Ahhhhhh, it's my favorite!!

I didn't get doors for the pantry until the last minute. I wanted to find something really cool and different. I really wanted glass, but didn't look hard enough. Again, I called G and told him the dimensions I needed......he found me some cool red doors. I think these have about 12,000 coats of paint on them!! I left them as is, of course. They needed pulls and I had picked these cool brass ones up for my husbands office several months before. He never put them on his doors, so I stole them for the Creek Party! #perfection 

  There are a couple of sets similar to these on their website right now..... they won't last long! If you want to keep up with all the new findings at Southern Accents, you can follow their Facebook page. The inventory changes daily. I am heading up a blogger meetup next week sponsored by Southern Accents and Hometalk. If you haven't been to the Hometalk website. Go there NOW! You can thank me later! 

Creek Party is in Full Swing!

The most gorgeous day of the year (so far). We were so lucky to be at the Creek Party today!!

I love these brass pulls on the pantry doors! 

The girls were acting tough after their mud ridin'. 

 Lots of fish to be caught today! These were all thrown back, but the kids were all thrilled!

 Will's first fish!!

Katie's first fish!!

A canoe ride took a turn for the worse over the rapids! That water was cold!

The end of the day on the road out.  This day is exactly what I dreamed of when building this house. Lots of memories in the making! A perfect end to a perfect day!

Hickory Flooring at the Creek Party!

This flooring came in several months ago to Southern Accents. I knew it was going to be gorgeous and knew I would use it somewhere! I was thrilled when the Creek Party! plans were coming to fruition and I would have a house to build. We lived in our last house for 7 years and while I was VERY sad to move, I was also VERY ready to change a few things. The Creek Party! was the perfect place for my creativity. I've been giving you sneak peeks along the way. We are opening the house this weekend for the first real party. Connor's Grandfather turned 85 in January and we are celebrating with the 50 close family members! I saw on the weather that it's going to be gorgeous that day! {yay}

So, back to the hickory flooring. That's why we're here, right? They milled this floor in several widths. I love wide plank flooring, so we went with the 5 inch planks. The main floor is hardwood and the basement is stained concrete. I'm just going to show off the pics now.

I was in the loft looking down on the floors in this picture. That is a ladder and it's HIGH! But, I love the color variation in this flooring. We chose to just put a clear coat on them to show the natural colorations!

 Another "top" view.

You may have seen this one before. That screen door, the wood balcony for the loft and the heart pine table built by Connor's Grandfather. I love this picture!

 A view of the kitchen. This is one I took and instagrammed. The house was still unfinished here, but you can see the skin wrapped beams and that octagon shaped one in the center is a beauty!

Creek Party - One More Week!

We only have one more week before the Creek Party will be holding it's first party!! We are celebrating my husband's Grandfather's birthday. We call him Papa. He is 85 years young! We're so excited to break in the Creek Party for his birthday. It is the perfect first "party", don't you think?

We were out there on Saturday and Sunday. We made beds, hung pictures and other fun stuff on the walls. The kids played climbing up and down the ladder! We HAVE to get a staircase to get into the loft. It's high and dangerous!

In the basement, we have barn wood skins on the walls. They are very rustic. It's a huge open room with concrete floors, a bar on one end and the door at the other end is a garage door. I have a feeling it will stay open ALL the time! We may need one of those screen things to keep the bugs out!

I took a few pics with my iphone of the crate-shelving wall. I wanted these over the table for games, etc. We decided to move it to another wall and I have a feeling it will be moved once again. Here is what is up now. I got these at Scott's Antique Market last month. I'm heading back there on Friday and can't WAIT! I will be getting a few more, no doubt. These are great for lots of projects.

Anyone notice it's the shape of an L? Laura and I decided it looked best that way ;)!

I also hung the arrow chalkboard. I've been selling these in my Etsy shop. I had this one left and knew in the back of my mind it would end up at the creek! I LOVE the way it looks on this wall. It's the first thing you see when you walk downstairs.

This is such a cool place and I know there will be lots of memories made here. I plan on sharing as many details as I can here. It's going to be a great party!!!

Lucysinspired Friday Wrap-Up

This week has been full! It's amazing to  me how it can fill up so quickly! I've picked up a new social media client and think it's going to be a fun one! Lots of creative ideas floating around in my head!

Since Monday was a holiday, I got to go out to the creek party! house and take a few pictures. I shared a couple of them here. We were going to try and move in next week, but The Connor Farmer got it in his head it needed to happen today. He's got the moving truck out there unloading right now.....I guess I need to get ready to fluff! Here's one more peek before I head out.

On Tuesday, I headed North to Southern Accents. I walked around the store looking for what would go into our booth at the Birmingham Home and Garden Show. You have to come see me. It's going to be a great booth and we are doing giveaways! eeeek! I shot this picture and I'm still loving it! You can follow along Lucysinspired on Facebook to see things as they hit me!

Wednesday, I picked up a new client. I have this secret love of hardware, door hardware, that is. You've seen Lucy Locket's, right? I met Eric at Brandino Brass and we decided it was a perfect fit. I would start working on their social media. You may see Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter posts that sound a little like Lucy. If so, just click like or make a comment. We will all appreciate it! (thanks to Molly for the referral!) One reason I knew this would be a good thing? This door. I love this massive thing! I stood in front of it at SA last year and was amazed at the size of it. I love how they use it as the door to block off the storage area of the store! don't you?

Thursday took me to Deconstructive Waste Services. Sara and I will be friends. I can promise that! She has been salvaging cool architectural pieces from this recycling pile! I found some really cool things. Ashlee, Lori and I made a morning of it. We filled Ashlee's car and I have to go back with a truck for my haul! This one little pic sums it up! Thanks, Lori, for always capturing the moment! I will be giving you a personal tour of this place in a few weeks! Can't wait to share some of my favorite salvage places around the South!

I also got to meet the girls behind The Scout Guide Birmingham. I love their publication. It's gorge! You need to look for it around town. It's all about the to do and see in our area!

I hope you had a great week! I love being busy and creative.

First Peeks from the Creek Party!

I guess I should explain why I call the creek house the Creek Party! First of all, it's a weekender kind of place. It's about 30 minutes outside of Birmingham and it's a family place. My husband has a huge family and he and his cousins have been working on this property for months! My vision for the house is that everyone will come out and play (party) every weekend! The main reason it got the name is because a year ago, we were selling the property on the other side of the creek and my son wanted to have his birthday party out there. We were going to camp out and canoe down the creek. I started a pinboard on Pinterest to gather all of my ideas! You know, s'mores buffet, tent invites, the whole shebang. Next thing I know, all the lots have been sold and my hubby decides to tell me we bought the property on the other side of the creek and we are going to build a cabin! Now, I started pinning cabin ideas to that board so I could keep up with the ideas! The Creek Party! was born.

I post about it all the time on my Lucysinspired page and I get questions about where and what I'm talking about. We have been working on it for several months and I have been out there a thousand times. I was usually so busy, I forgot to take pictures. Plus, it was all junked up with dust and generators and dumpsters! The floors upstairs were finished over the weekend and we needed to pick out the concrete stain color, so we made a day of it and went out to the house! I took my good camera and my iphone. I wanted to do a few sneak peeks on Instagram and do an official blog post when it was all done. I was just asked where a picture on facebook could be pinned from. Got me thinking about giving you all a little teaser! Here are just a few of the photos I took today.

This was taken standing inside the kitchen. Those beams were LVL beams and I was UPSET when I saw them! I wanted everything to be reclaimed. I couldn't quite find beams long enough for this room and they decided to go on without me. My brother, Charlie, was the contractor on site and he gave me the idea to clad the beams with barn wood. I wanted skins that were the same size as the LVL beams. Again, couldn't be found. I finally gave in and went to Southern Accents and had Shane pull the barn wood for me. These were skins from barn wood. It had been milled so that it was the same thickness and width. It was perfect! It's been a few weeks since I was there and when I walked in today, I was so impressed! They looked GREAT! What do you think?

I also love that rusted tin ceiling. The wood on the ceiling in the kitchen is pick wick paneling. I knew this room would be able to handle a lot of texture with the tall ceilings. I feel like the sheetrock is the perfect backdrop for all that beautiful texture! I can't wait for you to see the floors! #imgiddy

This was taken looking into the kitchen. You can see the seams from the barn wood (if you look closely). The painters are coming tomorrow to finish up the kitchen walls and put another coat on everything. We also decided to paint the floor in the loft red AND the stairs going into the basement! This photo is of the floors. OH MY GOODNESS! I'm in love with them!! They are hickory and very wide planks. Purchased from Southern Accents.  We just put a good clear coat on them to bring out the natural colors. That beam in the center of the room is an octagon. I've never seen a beam with 8 sides! Garlan sent me a picture of it one day laying out at the wood museum. I had to have it! I am such a sucker for something unusual. I can always find a spot for it somewhere! We used the ends of it as brackets for the fireplace. You can find a huge selection of beams.....you guessed it, Southern Accents! There's a lot more to show of this house! Can't wait to share it with you!

New Friends and Arrow Chalkboards

I have a new friend and her name is Ashlee. She and I were introduced by a mutual friend. We were told we had to meet because we were so much alike! Lori was right. The day we met we continually found things we had in common.

She and I decided to make a trip to Atlanta on Thursday. It was the last day of Cash 'N Carry at the America's Mart in Atlanta and the first day of Scott's Antique Market. One more reason we HAD to go on Thursday was to meet the Novogratz. It's pretty much the only decorating show I watch. I LOVE their style. My main goal, though, was to get more of these arrows to make more chalkboards.

She volunteered to drive. Her car is a bit bigger than mine. When she showed up at the house Thursday morning at 7am, she had all the seats cleared out...this girl knew what she was doing! I threw in my luggage and off we went!

We made it to the Mart first and started in Building 3. There were rows and rows of jewelry. I knew this wasn't where we wanted to be. We stopped in at Blue Ocean Traders. They always have fun items and never sell individual pieces. You have to order a crate and I can't afford a crate!!! I was glad to find olive buckets for more lights like this one in my Etsy shop. I also found a cute porcelain hand to hang jewelry on. (wishing I had bought several of those) We knew we needed to get to Scott's soon. We wanted plenty of time to find unique treasures!

I found a cool industrial light for a good price and Ashlee found a really cute wooden moose. Her maiden name is Moose and she collects them! Cute, huh?

I finally made it over to the rusty letter place, found Chad and started working a deal. I needed more arrows to make chalkboards!  I found a really cute star that I knew I could use. There was only one arrow, but Chad said he could get me more from the warehouse. I finally got the deal I was looking for. We would just have to come back Friday morning.

I made these this afternoon. I have 2 of the arrows sold. I want to keep one to take to the Creek Party house, but I have a listing in my Etsy shop. If it sells, I might have to make another trip! I'm loving that star!

I found a few more things I wanted, but couldn't bring myself to pay what they were asking. (a new way of thinking ;) for me) I went to find Ashlee. She found a great wood pedestal for a great price and I ended up getting one, too. We found so many fun things all over Scott's. I think I could go every weekend and find something!! Too bad it's only open once a month.

Up next, The Novogratz! We made it to Barnes and Noble and bought our books. We were lucky to get there a little early and sat in the 2nd row! They came out and looked just like they do on tv. Bob gave a little background on their story and then Cortney gave us a few tips on design rules. Even though, she doesn't know the rules! She's never been schooled in design. (just one of the things we have in common) They asked if anyone had questions. I asked if they had been shopping in Atlanta, told them to go to Scott's and the Mart! There were a few others asking questions. I think I asked the most! We got our books signed and had a photo made. I'm so glad to have met them. 

Today is Ashlee's birthday. I made her this frame. Her number is 22. Her kids birthdays are the 22nd and her husbands. Her birthday is 11/11. Hello, that equals 22. Love numbers with meaning! 

The Creek Party is in Full Swing!

This place is rocking and rolling! Connor and I went to meet several of the contractors yesterday. I was bombarded with questions! Where do you want the vents, where do you want the lights, do you like where the recessed lighting is placed, how tall are the baseboards, where is the front door.....OH MY WORD! I had forgotten how much goes into building a house! We hired my brother, Charlie, to be in charge. That makes it easier. Especially, since there is NO signal out there! You can't talk on the phone and texts go through sporadically. Right now, that is a royal pain. Once we are there for pleasure, it will be so wonderful!

It turned out to be a long afternoon. I was meeting the guys that were delivering the salvaged lumber for the walls and ceiling and their radiator hose busted. We were less than half a mile from the interstate and had to pull over. (I was showing them the way(there are a lot of turns)). I drove to the store and got water. When I got back they had taken the hose off and realized they needed a new one! We were in luck, there was an Advanced Auto Parts store by the interstate. Shane hopped in with me and off we went. The bad news is, they didn't have the right one. We would have to drive to Fairfield to get it. Ok, that's 20 minutes away. Finally, we picked up the right one! Did I mention they are in a Dooley truck and a 30 foot trailer on the back? It's not an easy thing to maneuver. We got back and they fixed it right up! They could only drive about 30 miles per hour and they were following me. It was hard for me to go that slow! We finally made it out to the creek. They thought we had taken a wrong turn. I took them out to the woods and frankly, I think they were a little scared! 

It was the longest day!!!

I had to leave as soon as we got there. Emma was captain at the game and I couldn't miss it!! 

She was calling a cheer! I was so proud of her. She did a great job!